


Chromatic

by Newtavore



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Color Blindness, Drift Compatibility, Drift Side Effects, Gen, No Dialogue, Slight Ableism, Stream of Consciousness, Synesthesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-17
Updated: 2014-02-17
Packaged: 2018-01-12 21:00:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1200375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Newtavore/pseuds/Newtavore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Synesthetic Newt, Achromatopsic Hermann, and the way they drift together. Just a quick, self indulgent headcanon piece.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chromatic

**Author's Note:**

> Ahaha yeah me and my weird headcanons. Also I wrote this at four in the morning keep that in min when you read it.

Newt sees everything in color. 

 

Bright shades spark in his vision with every word, every sound, every image, every movement. Blues and greens and yellows, reds and pinks, every color imaginable, colors not of this earth, this universe, this dimension, they all decorate his view of the world. 

 

He's been told it's a mental disorder, a condition, a problem, but all he knows is beauty. 

 

He doesn't mind when he is informed it makes him ineligible for the piloting program. He's better at science anyways. He doesn't mind when his observations garner strange looks, whispers behind his back, mutterings of ' _crazy_ '. He knows it is because they don't see the world the way he does, and he pities them for it. 

 

Like a disorder, a condition, this has side effects. Not all of them are bad. Music is an experience like none other, nearly orgasmic, sounds and beats combining with beautiful colors and patterns till he's so overwhelmed he can't take it. Playing music is almost better, because he can create the patterns, the colors that he wants, see them float across his vision like neon fireflies, like spinning glow sticks at a rave, mesmerizing, hypnotic. 

 

Memorization, learning, reading is easy. Information lights up for him, his mind like a built in highlighter, important things backed by stronger colors, supplementary information written in pastels, light and airy and there just enough to add context and contrast. Learning is beautiful in this way, knowledge painting pictures in his mind. 

 

Not all things are good, either. Sometimes, he wears clothes that do not match. The colors look beautiful together, they combine and mix perfectly to him, but he forgets that other people cannot see the world he lives in, and he is judged for it. He fixes this by wearing plain clothes, white shirts, black ties, black pants. Things that always match, no matter who was viewing them. 

 

Sometimes, there's too much. The colors, the lights, the sounds, the smells, they all combine into raucous noise and sensation and send him crying to his darkened, soundproof room for days, clutching his head and desperately wishing for everything to just _stop_. There is no way to fix this, so he spends those days in a sort of limbo, pain and color blending together until sharp reds stab him and deep blues drown him, unable to differentiate between the physical and the mental. 

 

Sometimes, he forgets that others do not experience the same things he does, cannot see the painfully beautiful things he does, and he makes comments, or watches light shows that are only for his eyes. They do not see. He tries to explain it, tries to make them understand his curse and his gift all wrapped up into one, but as soon as they hear the  label, they no longer look at him as a person. They see him as something broken, something damaged, and at those times, he almost hates himself for being different. 

 

Almost. He can never truly hate this, the colors, the sounds, the smells and tastes, patterns, textures, physical sensation in mental form, a scientific curiosity and a sensory experiment. There is too much it gives him, too much it allows him to experience, and so, at those times, he pities those who feel like he is not whole because, in his eyes, he is more whole than they will ever be. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hermann sees everything in shades of grey, unyielding and unforgiving. 

 

He does not mind particularly much. He has lived his entire life colorless without particular hardship, and does not see any need for it. 

 

There is a term for his condition. _Achromatopsia_. The very name leaves a rather bitter taste on his tongue, as though the Latin itself poisons as he speaks it. It brings to mind memories of concerned teachers, of doctor's visits, of his mother sadly telling him the names of colors that he will never see, of foolish people believing he is less than them, less than an intelligent, successful scientist, all because of one lack. he closes his eyes and sighs, wondering, not for the first time, what the big deal is anyway. 

 

Colour affects everyone who sees it in the strangest ways, from pilots crying over a sunrise to techs screaming over a discolored panel. The dramatics associated with it never cease to annoy him and, at times, he is grateful he can not see it. He likes his neat, orderly world of black, white, and grey. In his eyes, his condition was even a boon, in some ways. Colour causes distraction, prompts people to react emotionally in ways they typically wouldn't, and causes the most astonishingly stupid biases. 

 

That is not to say that seeing something other than greyscale would not be welcome, sometimes. Picking and choosing what to wear, for example, is nigh on impossible. Though he had tried, once, to label his clothes so he could tell them apart, he soon realized that he is physically incapable of matching something that he has never seen. He knows not how the colors combine- blue, green, red, yellow, pink, these words mean nothing to him, nothing other than slightly lighter or darker shades of grey. 

 

Before his accident had left him with another reason to be thought of as less, another, more obvious sign of his differences, he had once wanted to be a pilot. Without the ability to see color- it always came back to blasted color- he was shafted from the program despite all the time and effort he'd spent making it through training. He understands the reasoning, in that being able to tell apart the controls, to see the difference between a Kaiju and the dark sea, is an important thing, one he would have much difficulty with, yet it still burns him. His twenty drop, twenty kill record (though it had not stayed a record long) had, perhaps, made the burn that much harder to deal with. 

 

Everything, though, is simpler without color. He does not see the color of people's skin, of their clothes, of their eyes or hair or teeth. He does not judge people on their manner of dress or their appearance, simply on their attitude and merit. If he does not like someone, it is because they are an idiot, not because of the way they look. He wishes, sometimes, that everyone could be as blind as him, as incomplete and imperfect as he is, because maybe then, the world would be as simple as the greyscale he sees it with.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bonding together is an experience that neither of them knows how to deal with. 

 

Newton, so used to dealing with bright things and shining colors, noises, _taste-touch-smell-sight_ , does not know how to deal with the shock of nothing. There is suddenly no color, and, in the back of his mind, he notices that everything is quiet for the first time in his life, and he is terrified. 

 

Hermann, so used to simple things and even simpler perceptions, is overwhelmed almost immediately. Colours he's never seen dance in his vision, flaring and changing with every breath he takes, and he is simultaneously terrified and in awe of it. There is so much, so suddenly, he's dizzy with it, head pounding, eyes watering at the assault of everything. 

 

They latch onto each other, Newton reeling blindly in a world gone still, Hermann swaying and clutching drunkenly, _seeing-touching-tasting-exeriencing_ too much all at once and yet, somehow, just as blind. They touch, and everything _stops_. The world stops turning, they both stop breathing, everything slows down to a crawl and they stare, eyes wide, at each other, every thought and memory crashing though their heads at the same time, and  for a few terrifying moments they are unable to differentiate between themselves, existing not as two but as one. 

 

They separate, and _they_ are not _he_ anymore, but Newton and Hermann, themselves, _two_. They settle back into their perceptions, Newton closing his eyes as color ricochets around him, Hermann reveling in his neat, orderly greyscale universe. 

 

They are both very different, but in some ways, they are similar. 


End file.
